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Actor McConaughey calls for gun legislation at White House
Academy Award–winning actor Matthew McConaughey made an appearance at the White House Tuesday to call on Congress to “reach a higher ground” and pass gun control legislation in honor of the children and teachers killed in last month’s shooting rampage at an elementary school in his hometown of Uvalde, Texas.
In a highly personal 22-minute speech, McConaughey exhorted a gridlocked Congress to pass gun reforms that can save lives without infringing on Second Amendment rights.
McConaughey, a gun owner himself, used his star power to make an argument for legislation in a fashion that the Biden administration has not been able to muster, offering a clear connection to the small Texas town and vividly detailing the sheer loss of the 19 children and two teachers in the second worst mass school shooting in U.S. history.
He specifically called on Congress to bolster background checks for gun purchases and raise the minimum age to purchase an AR-15-style rifle to 21 from 18.
“We want secure and safe schools and we want gun laws that won’t make it so easy for the bad guys to get the damn guns,” McConaughey said.
McConaughey, who earlier this year considered a run for governor of Texas before taking a pass, met briefly in private with President Joe Biden before addressing the White House press corps from the James Brady briefing room.
Also read: Officials: Texas shooter talked about guns in private chats
McConaughey has also met with key lawmakers this week, including Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee that handles gun legislation, Sen. Dick Durbin of Illinois, and the panel’s ranking Republican Sen. Chuck Grassley of Iowa.
Also Tuesday, the son of Ruth Whitfield, an 86-year-old woman killed when a gunman opened fire in a racist attack on Black shoppers in Buffalo, New York, last month, called on Congress to act against the “cancer of white supremacy” and the nation’s epidemic of gun violence.
“Is there nothing that you personally are willing to do to stop the cancer of white supremacy and the domestic terrorism it inspires?” Garnell Whitfield Jr. asked members of the Senate Judiciary Committee.
McConaughey, who declined to take questions, spoke of his own connections to the town. He said his mother taught kindergarten less than a mile from Uvalde’s Robb Elementary School, the site of the May 24 shooting. He also noted that Uvalde was the place where he was taught about responsibilities that come with gun ownership.
“Uvalde is where I was taught to revere the power and the capability of the tool that we call a gun,” he said
McConaughey said he and his wife drove back to Uvalde on the day after the shooting and spent time with the families of some of the victims and others directly affected by the rampage.
He said every parent he spoke to expressed that “they want their children’s dreams to live on.”
“They want to make their loss of life matter,” McConaughey said.
He related the personal stories of a number of the victims.
He told the story of Maite Rodriguez, an aspiring marine biologist. McConaughey's wife, Camila, sitting nearby, held a pair of green Converse sneakers resembling those that the girl often wore.
Also read: NRA speakers unshaken on gun rights after school massacre
McConaughey said the sneakers "turned out to be the only clear evidence that could identify her after the shooting."
He held up artwork from Alithia Ramirez, who dreamed of attending art school in Paris. And then there was Eliahna “Ellie” Garcia, who loved dancing and church and already knew how to drive tractors. Ellie was looking forward to reading a Bible verse at an upcoming church service when she was killed.
McConaughey acknowledged that gun legislation would not end mass shootings but suggested that steps can be taken to lessen the chances of such tragedies happening so frequently.
"We need to invest in mental healthcare. We need safer schools. We need to restrain sensationalized media coverage. We need to restore our family values. We need to restore our American values and we need responsible gun ownership,” McConaughey said.
“Is this a cure-all? Hell no, but people are hurting."
Authorities: 3 dead, trooper wounded in Maryland shooting
An employee opened fire at a manufacturing business in rural western Maryland on Thursday, killing three coworkers before the suspect and a state trooper were wounded in a shootout, authorities said.
Washington County Sheriff Doug Mullendore said that three victims were found dead at Columbia Machine Inc. in Smithsburg and a fourth victim was critically injured. The sheriff said at a news conference that the victims and suspect were all employees at the facility.
The suspect fled in a vehicle before authorities arrived at the scene and was tracked down by Maryland State Police, Mullendore said. The suspect and a trooper were wounded in an exchange of gunfire, according to the sheriff.
Mullendore said the suspect was a 42-year-old man but declined to release his name while criminal charges were being prepared.
The sheriff identified those killed in the shooting as Mark Alan Frey, 50; Charles Edward Minnick Jr., 31; and Joshua Robert Wallace, 30. Mullendore said the wounded victim was Brandon Chase Michael, 42
Maryland State Police Lt. Col. Bill Dofflemyer said that three troopers encountered the suspect's vehicle and that he opened fire when troopers made a traffic stop. Troopers returned fire, wounding the suspect. Dofflemyer said the wounded trooper is doing well and that the suspect was being treated Thursday night.
Authorities declined to release a motive.
Also read: 4 killed in shooting at Tulsa medical building; shooter dead
“We’re still working with sheriff’s office on what happened and why it kept escalating,” Dofflemyer told reporters.
Mullendore said the suspect used a semiautomatic handgun, which was recovered after the shootout. He declined to specify the caliber or model.
Family members of workers at the manufacturer were gathering at a fire station in downtown Smithsburg on Thursday evening, awaiting information on their loved ones. They declined to speak to a reporter.
Several hours after the shooting, numerous law enforcement officers remained at the scene. Police had closed off the road that runs past the Columbia Machine Inc. facility, and yellow tape blew in the wind outside the business.
Messages left seeking comment with the company weren’t immediately returned.
Smithsburg, a community of nearly 3,000 people, is just west of the Camp David presidential retreat and about 75 miles (120 kilometers) northwest of Baltimore. The manufacturing facility was in a sparsely populated area northeast of the town's center with a church, several businesses and farmland nearby.
U.S. Sen. Chris Van Hollen, a Maryland Democrat, lamented the loss of life in his state so soon after other recentshootings and vowed action.
Also read: Texas elementary school shooting: What do we know so far?
“Today's horrific shooting comes as our state and nation have witnessed tragedy after tragedy, and it's got to stop,” he said in a statement. “We must act to address the mass shootings and daily toll of gun violence on our communities.”
David Creamer, 69, is a member of Smithburg’s volunteer fire department and has lived in town since 1988. He saw alerts related to the shooting go out shortly before 3 p.m.
Creamer said the last fatal shooting that he can recall in Smithsburg was roughly a decade ago.
“This stuff doesn’t happen here,” Creamer said. “Everybody pretty knows everybody. It’s a family atmosphere. We watch out for each other.”
Creamer was chatting with neighbors at a Little League game on Thursday evening. He wore a T-shirt promoting a gun rights organization.
The shooting “makes me feel even stronger about it. I just feel that I should be able to protect my family and my neighbors. In a community like this, everybody is your neighbor,” he said.
Funeral home employee Ashley Vigrass, 29, lives less than a mile (kilometer) from where the shooting occurred. She was home with her two children when her fiancée called to tell her about the shooting and urged her to keep the kids inside the house.
“The helicopters were out,” she said.
Asked if she was shaken by the shooting, Vigrass said, “I feel like we come from a desensitized era.”
“You feel something, but it’s the same thing that you felt yesterday,” she added as she watched the Little League game. “It’s unfortunate, but you just got to make sure the kids are safe to play baseball and carry on.”
4th grade Uvalde survivor: ‘I don’t want it to happen again’
An 11-year-old girl who survived the mass shooting at an elementary school in Uvalde, Texas, recounted in video testimony to Congress on Wednesday how she covered herself with a dead classmate’s blood to avoid being shot and “just stayed quiet.”
Miah Cerrillo, a fourth-grader at Robb Elementary School, told lawmakers in a prerecorded video that she watched a teacher get shot in the head before looking for a place to hide.
“I thought he would come back so I covered myself with blood,” Miah told the House panel. “I put it all over me and I just stayed quiet.” She called 911 using the deceased teacher’s phone and pleaded for help.
Nineteen children and two teachers died when an 18-year-old gunman opened fire with an AR-15-style rifle inside Robb Elementary School on May 24.
It was the second day lawmakers heard wrenching testimony on the nation’s gun violence. On Tuesday, a Senate panel heard from the son of an 86-year-old woman killed when a gunman opened fire in a racist attack on Black shoppers in Buffalo, New York, on May 14. Ten people died.
In the video Wednesday, Miah’s father, Miguel Cerrillo, asked his daughter if she feels safe at school anymore. She shook her head no.
“Why?” he asks. “I don’t want it to happen again,” she responds.
The testimony at the House Oversight Committee came as lawmakers work to strike a bipartisan agreement on gun safety measures in the aftermath of back-to-back mass shootings.
Read: Texas elementary school shooting: What do we know so far?
Rep. Carolyn Maloney, D-N.Y., the panel’s chairwoman, called the hearing to focus on the human impact of gun violence and the urgency for gun control legislation.
“I am asking every member of this committee to listen with an open heart to the brave witnesses who have come forward to tell their stories about how gun violence has impacted their lives,” Maloney said. “Our witnesses today have endured pain and loss. Yet they are displaying incredible courage by coming here to ask us to do our jobs.”
But even as some lawmakers shed tears alongside the witnesses, the hearing displayed the contentious debate over gun control Congress has faced repeatedly after mass shootings. Several Republicans turned the conversation to the individuals who abuse guns and how “hardening schools” could help protect students.
Rep. Andrew Clyde, R-Ga., who owns a gun store, said that one of the things he learned in his military service was that “the harder the target you are, the less likely you will be engaged by the enemy.” He
called on schools to keep doors locked, provide a single point of entry and “a volunteer force of well-trained and armed staff, in addition to a school resource officer.”
The parents of victims and survivors implored lawmakers not to let their children’s deaths and pain be in vain. After Miah spoke, her father told lawmakers that he testified because “I could have lost my baby girl.”
“But she is not the same little girl that I use to play with,” Cerrillo said. “Schools are not safe anymore. Something needs to really change.”
Also testifying was Zeneta Everhart, whose 20-year-old son Zaire was wounded in the Buffalo mass shooting.
Everhart told lawmakers it was their duty to draft legislation that protects Zaire and other Americans. She said that if they did not find the testimony moving enough to act on gun laws, they had an invitation to go to her home to help her clean her son’s wounds.
“My son Zaire has a hole in the right side of his neck, two on his back, and another on his left leg,” she said, then paused to compose herself. “As I clean his wounds, I can feel pieces of that bullet in his back. Shrapnel will be left inside of his body for the rest of his life. Now I want you to picture that exact scenario for one of your children.”
The parents of Lexi Rubio, who died in her classroom in Uvalde, also testified. Felix and Kimberly Rubio recounted finding out about their daughter’s death hours after leaving Lexi’s school awards ceremony where she had been recognized as an A-student. To celebrate, they had promised to get her ice cream.
To get to the elementary school after the shooting, Kimberly Rubio said she ran barefoot for a mile with her sandals in her hand and with her husband by her side. A firefighter eventually gave them a ride back to the civic center.
“Soon after we received the news that our daughter was among the 19 students and two teachers that died as a result of gun violence,” she said, fighting through tears.
She said that Lexi would have made a positive change in the world if she had been given the chance.
“Somewhere out there, there’s a mom listening to our testimony, thinking I can’t even imagine their pain, not knowing that our reality will one day be hers unless we act now,” Kimberly Rubio said.
Dr. Roy Guerrero described in stark terms the carnage he witnessed at the local hospital as he tried to treat the injured. He went to the area of the hospital where two dead children had been taken. The bodies were so pulverized, he said, “that the only clue to their identities was the blood-splattered cartoon clothes still clinging to them, clinging for life and finding none.”
Read: Texas police: School door shut but didn’t lock before attack
After the hearing was over, the Democratic-led House passed legislation that would raise the age limit for purchasing a semi-automatic rifle and prohibit the sale of ammunition magazines with a capacity of more than 10 rounds.
But the legislation has almost no chance of becoming law as the Senate pursues negotiations focused on improving mental health programs, bolstering school security and enhancing background checks. The House bill does allow Democratic lawmakers a chance to frame for voters in November where they stand on policies that polls show appeal to a majority.
Majorities of U.S. adults think mass shootings would occur less often if guns were harder to get, and that schools and other public places have become less safe than they were two decades ago.
Chairwoman Maloney ended the lengthy hearing Wednesday telling the loved ones of the victims and survivors that the committee’s work on this topic will continue. Days after the Uvalde shooting the committee launched an investigation into five leading manufacturers of the semi-automatic weapons used in both the recent shootings.
“Over the last few days, the committee has received information from these companies that is very troubling,” Maloney said. “I also intend to hold a second hearing to hear directly from the gun industry, so they can explain to the American people why they continue to sell the weapons of choice for mass murderers.”
Trump set to undergo questioning in July in NY civil probe
Former President Donald Trump, his namesake son and his daughter Ivanka have agreed to answer questions under oath next month in the New York attorney general’s civil investigation into his business practices, unless their lawyers persuade the state’s highest court to step in.
A Manhattan judge signed off Wednesday on an agreement that calls for the Trumps to give depositions — a legal term for sworn, pretrial testimony out of court — starting July 15.
Messages seeking comment were sent to the ex-president’s attorneys. State Attorney General Letitia James’ office declined to comment, as did the younger Trumps’ attorney, Alan Futerfas.
Another Trump son, Eric Trump, gave a deposition in 2020 but declined to answer some questions.
The new agreement comes after a series of setbacks for Donald Trump’s efforts to block James’ 3-year-long investigation.
James has said the probe has uncovered evidence that Trump’s company exaggerated the value of assets such as skyscrapers, golf courses and even his Manhattan penthouse to get loans, insurance and tax breaks for land donations. A lawyer for her office told a judge last month that evidence could support legal action against the former president, his company or both, though the attorney said no decision had been made.
Trump has decried the investigation as part of a politically motivated “witch hunt” against him.
A New York state appeals court ruled May 26 that Trump had to undergo a deposition, upholding a lower court’s ruling that the attorney general had “the clear right” to question Trump and certain other principals in his company.
Read: Trump wins acquittal, but Ukraine saga far from over
Then, on May 27, a federal judge dismissed a lawsuit that Trump had filed to seek a court order stopping James from investigating him.
The suit claimed that James, a Democrat, targeted the Republican ex-president because of political animus and violated his free speech and due process rights. A lawyer for Trump said at the time that the dismissal would be appealed.
James, meanwhile, said Trump had lobbed “baseless legal challenges” at her investigation and vowed it would continue.
Wednesday’s agreement acknowledges that the Trumps can appeal to New York’s top court, called the Court of Appeals, to try to overturn the decision that requires their depositions.
The former president had plenty of experience with such questioning during his business career, and he gave a deposition just this past October in a lawsuit filed by protesters who said his security team roughed them up during his first presidential campaign.
James’ office started investigating Trump in 2019, after his former personal lawyer Michael Cohen told Congress that the businessperson-turned-politician had a history of misrepresenting the value of assets to gain favorable loan terms and tax benefits.
James’ office also has been involved in a parallel, but separate, investigation by the Manhattan district attorney’s office.
FBI seizes retired general’s data related to Qatar lobbying
The FBI has seized the electronic data of a retired four-star general who authorities say made false statements and withheld “incriminating” documents about his role in an illegal foreign lobbying campaign on behalf of the wealthy Persian Gulf nation of Qatar.
New federal court filings obtained Tuesday outlined a potential criminal case against former Marine Gen. John R. Allen, who led U.S. and NATO forces in Afghanistan before being tapped in 2017 to lead the influential Brookings Institution.
It’s part of an expanding investigation that has ensnared Richard G. Olson, a former ambassador to the United Arab Emirates and Pakistan who pleaded guilty to federal charges last week, and Imaad Zuberi, a prolific political donor now serving a 12-year prison sentence on corruption charges.
The court filings detail Allen’s behind-the scenes efforts to help Qatar influence U.S. policy in 2017 when a diplomatic crisis erupted between the gas-rich Persian Gulf monarchy and its neighbors.
Read: Biden evacuated after plane entered airspace near beach home
“There is substantial evidence that these FARA violations were willful,” FBI agent Babak Adib wrote in a search warrant application, referring to the Foreign Agents Registration Act.
Allen also misrepresented his role in the lobbying campaign to U.S. officials, Adib wrote, and failed to disclose “that he was simultaneously pursuing multimillion-dollar business deals with the government of Qatar.”
The FBI says Allen gave a “false version of events” about his work for Qatar during a 2020 interview with law enforcement officials and failed to produce relevant email messages in response to an earlier grand jury subpoena, the affidavit says.
The 77-page application appears to have been filed in error and was removed from the docket Tuesday after The Associated Press reached out to federal authorities about its contents.
Allen declined to comment on the new filings. He has previously denied ever working as a Qatari agent and said his efforts on Qatar in 2017 were motivated to prevent a war from breaking out in the Gulf that would put U.S. troops at risk.
Allen spokesperson Beau Phillips told AP last week that Allen “voluntarily cooperated with the government’s investigation into this matter.”
The Brookings Institution, one of the most influential think tanks in the U.S., did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Qatar has long been one of Brookings’ biggest financial backers, though the institution says it has recently stopped taking Qatari funding.
Read: Doctor, nurses stabbed at California hospital; man arrested
Olson was working with Zuberi on another matter involving Qatar when Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and other Gulf countries announced a blockade of the gas-rich monarchy over Qatar’s alleged ties to terror groups and other issues in mid-2017.
Shortly after the blockade was announced, then-President Donald Trump appear to side against Qatar.
The court papers say Allen played an important role in shifting the U.S.’s response. Specifically, authorities say Allen lobbied then National Security Advisor H.R. McMaster to have the Trump administration adopt more Qatar-friendly tone.
In a June 9 email to McMaster, Allen said the Qataris were “asking for some help” and wanted the White House or State Department to issue a statement with specific language calling on all sides of the Gulf diplomatic crisis to “act with restraint.”
Federal law enforcement officials say then-Secretary of State Rex Tillerson did what Allen told McMaster the Qataris wanted done two days later, issuing a statement that “shifted away from earlier statements by the White House.” Tillerson’s statement called on other Gulf countries to “ease the blockade against Qatar” and asked “that there be no further escalation by the parties in the region.”
Biden evacuated after plane entered airspace near beach home
A small private airplane mistakenly entered restricted airspace near President Joe Biden's Delaware vacation home Saturday, prompting the brief evacuation of the president and first lady, the White House and the Secret Service said.
The White House said there was no threat to Biden or his family and that precautionary measures were taken. After the situation was assessed, Biden and his wife, Jill, returned to their Rehoboth Beach home.
The Secret Service said in a statement that the plane was immediately escorted from the restricted airspace after “mistakenly entering a secured area.” The agency said it would interview the pilot who, according to a preliminary investigation, was not on the proper radio channel and was not following published flight guidance.
READ: Biden says US sending medium-range rocket systems to Ukraine
As is standard practice for presidential trips outside Washington, the Federal Aviation Administration published flight restrictions earlier this week before Biden’s beach town visit. The restrictions include a 10-mile radius no-fly zone contained with a 30-mile restricted zone.
A CBS News reporter said on Twitter that he saw Biden motorcading to a Rehoboth Beach fire station. The group of reporters that travels with the president was not part of the motorcade.
Federal regulations require pilots to check for flight restrictions along their route before taking off. Still, accidental airspace breaches, particularly around temporary restricted zones, are common.
U.S. military jets and Coast Guard helicopters are often used to intercept any planes that violate the flight restrictions around the president. Intercepted planes are diverted to a nearby airfield where aircrews are interviewed by law enforcement and face potential criminal or civil penalties.
Doctor, nurses stabbed at California hospital; man arrested
A man stabbed a doctor and two nurses inside a Southern California hospital emergency ward on Friday and remained inside a room for hours before police arrested him, authorities said.
The man walked into Encino Hospital Medical Center in the San Fernando Valley shortly before 4 p.m., Los Angeles police Officer Drake Madison said.
The man had parked his car in the middle of a street and went to the emergency room, where he asked for treatment for anxiety before stabbing the doctor and nurses, authorities said.
Fire officials said three victims were taken to a trauma center in critical condition. Police later said one was in critical condition and underwent surgery.
All three were later listed in stable condition at Dignity Health Northridge Hospital Medical Center.
The first floor of the Encino hospital and some nearby offices were evacuated, police said.
“We've moved patients out of the danger zone," LAPD Deputy Chief Alan Hamilton said at a news conference.
There was no evidence that the man knew the victims, Hamilton added.
The man remained inside a room in the hospital for about four hours as SWAT team members tried to unsuccessfully to negotiate with him before he was finally arrested, police said.
He was taken to another hospital for treatment of self-inflicted injuries to his arms, authorities said.
READ: Two cops among 4 stabbed by drug peddlers in Lalmonirhat
The man's name wasn't immediately released, but Hamilton said he had a lengthy criminal record, including two arrests last year for battery of a police officer and resisting arrest.
Benjamin Roman, an ultrasound technician, told KNBC-TV that before the stabbing, he saw the man, who had a dog with him and who might have been high on drugs because he looked anxious and was drenched in sweat.
After the hospital issued an “internal triage" code, Roman said he saw a doctor and a nurse who had been stabbed.
“The doctor looked (like) she was in pain," he said. “There was a lot of blood and it looked like ... he might have got her abdomen."
The attack comes only two days after a gunman killed four people and then himself at a hospital in Tulsa, Oklahoma. The assailant got inside a building on the Saint Francis Hospital campus with little trouble, just hours after buying an AR-style rifle, authorities said.
The man killed his surgeon and three other people at a medical office. He blamed the doctor for his continuing pain after a recent back operation.
Police say man shoots 2 females, self outside Iowa church
A man shot two females to death and then apparently killed himself Thursday night outside a church in Ames, authorities said.
The man killed the two females outside the Cornerstone Church, a megachurch on the outskirts of Ames, Story County Sheriff's Office Capt. Nicholas Lennie told the Des Moines Register. Investigators didn't know the ages of those killed, Lennie said.
Also read: 4 killed in shooting at Tulsa medical building; shooter dead
The shooter appeared to have then shot himself but his death is still being investigated, Lennie said.
The church is near Interstate 35, about 30 miles (48.28 kilometers) north of Des Moines.
The sheriff's office didn't identify those killed or give details about what led to the shooting. A news conference is planned Friday morning.
Also read: Officials: Texas shooter talked about guns in private chats
The sheriff's office told KCCI-TV that they received multiple calls at 6:51 p.m.
Texas police: School door shut but didn’t lock before attack
An exterior door at Robb Elementary School did not lock when it was closed by a teacher shortly before a gunman used it to get inside and kill 19 students and two teachers, leaving investigators searching to determine why, state police said Tuesday.
State police initially said a teacher had propped the door open shortly before Salvador Ramos, 18, entered the school in Uvalde, Texas, on May 24.
They have now determined that the teacher, who has not been identified, propped the door open with a rock, but then removed the rock and closed the door when she realized there was a shooter on campus, said Travis Considine, chief communications officer for the Texas Department of Public Safety. But, Considine said, the door that was designed to lock when shut did not lock.
“We did verify she closed the door. The door did not lock. We know that much and now investigators are looking into why it did not lock,” Considine said.
Investigators confirmed the detail through additional video footage reviewed since Friday’s news conference when authorities first said that the door had been left propped open. Authorities did not state at that time what had been used to prop open the door.
Considine said the teacher initially propped the door open but ran back inside to get her phone and call 911 when Ramos crashed his truck on campus.
Read: Biden says US sending medium-range rocket systems to Ukraine
“She came back out while on her phone, she heard someone yell, ‘He has a gun!’, she saw him jump the fence and that he had a gun, so she ran back inside,” removing the rock when she did, Considine said.
Steve McCraw, the head of DPS, hadn’t said why the teacher initially propped open the door when it was first detailed Friday. The first mention of a door left propped open, which officials now say didn’t happen, led to questions about the teacher’s actions and whether she had made a horrific mistake.
Since the shooting, law enforcement and state officials have struggled to present an accurate timeline and details of the event and how police responded, sometimes providing conflicting information or withdrawing some statements hours later. State police have said some accounts were preliminary and may change as more witnesses are interviewed.
San Antonio attorney Don Flanary told the San Antonio Express-News that the Robb Elementary School employee, whom he’s not naming, first propped open the door to carry food from a car to a classroom, and that she immediately moved to close it when she realized the danger.
“She kicked the rock away when she went back in. She remembers pulling the door closed while telling 911 that he was shooting,” Flanary told the newspaper.
“She thought the door would lock because that door is always supposed to be locked,” Flanary said.
Flanary did not immediately return telephone messages left at his office from The Associated Press.
Investigators are also still trying to interview Uvalde Consolidated Independent School District Police Chief Pete Arredondo, who state police have said was the commander of the school shooting scene while it happened. Arredondo has not responded to multiple requests for comment from The Associated Press.
McCraw, the head of the Texas Department of Public Safety, has said Arredondo treated the active scene as a hostage situation and as if children were no longer at risk, while 19 police officers waited in the school hallway outside the classroom where Ramos was.
McCraw called that the “wrong decision,” saying the focus of the investigation has shifted to Arredondo and the police response.
Read: High prices, Asian markets could blunt EU ban on Russian oil
Other officers in the Uvalde city and schools police departments continue to sit for interviews and provide statements, but Arredondo has not responded to DPS requests for two days, Considine said.
Later Tuesday, the Combined Law Enforcement Association of Texas, which represents police officers, urged its member officers to cooperate with “all government investigations” into the shooting and police response and endorsed a federal probe already announced by the Justice Department.
The organization was also sharply critical of the constantly changing narrative of events that has emerged so far.
“There has been a great deal of false and misleading information in the aftermath of this tragedy. Some of the information came from the very highest levels of government and law enforcement,” CLEAT said. “Sources that Texans once saw as iron-clad and completely reliable have now been proven false.”
Biden says US sending medium-range rocket systems to Ukraine
The Biden administration announced on Tuesday that it will send Ukraine a small number of high-tech, medium-range rocket systems, a critical weapon that Ukrainian leaders have been begging for as they struggle to stall Russian progress in the Donbas region.
The rocket systems are part of a new $700 million tranche of security assistance for Ukraine from the U.S. that will include helicopters, Javelin anti-tank weapon systems, tactical vehicles, spare parts and more, according to two senior administration officials. The officials spoke on the condition of anonymity to preview the weapons package that will be formally unveiled on Wednesday.
The U.S. decision to provide the advance rocket systems tries to strike a balance between the desire to help Ukraine battle ferocious Russian artillery barrages while not providing arms that could allow Ukraine to hit targets deep inside Russia and trigger an escalation in the war.
In a guest essay published Tuesday evening in The New York Times, President Joe Biden confirmed that he’s decided to “provide the Ukrainians with more advanced rocket systems and munitions that will enable them to more precisely strike key targets on the battlefield in Ukraine.”
Biden had said Monday that the U.S. would not send Ukraine “rocket systems that can strike into Russia.” Any weapons system can shoot into Russia if it’s close enough to the border. The aid package expected to be unveiled Wednesday would send what the U.S. considers medium-range rockets — they generally can travel about 45 miles (70 kilometers), the officials said.
The Ukrainians have assured U.S. officials that they will not fire rockets into Russian territory, according to the senior administration officials. One official noted that the advanced rocket systems will give Ukrainian forces greater precision in targeting Russian assets inside Ukraine.
The expectation is that Ukraine could use the rockets in the eastern Donbas region, where they could both intercept Russian artillery and take out Russian positions in towns where fighting is intense, such as Sievierodonetsk.
Read: High prices, Asian markets could blunt EU ban on Russian oil
Sievierodonetsk is important to Russian efforts to capture the Donbas before more Western arms arrive to bolster Ukraine’s defense. The city, which is 90 miles (145 kilometers) south of the Russian border, is in an area that is the last pocket under Ukrainian government control in the Luhansk region of the Donbas.
Biden in his New York Times’ essay added: “We are not encouraging or enabling Ukraine to strike beyond its borders. We do not want to prolong the war just to inflict pain on Russia.”
It’s the 11th package approved so far, and will be the first to tap the $40 billion in security and economic assistance recently passed by Congress. The rocket systems would be part of Pentagon drawdown authority, so would involve taking weapons from U.S. inventory and getting them into Ukraine quickly. Ukrainian troops would also need training on the new systems, which could take at least a week or two.
Officials said the plan is to send Ukraine the High Mobility Artillery Rocket System, or HIMARS, which is mounted on a truck and can carry a container with six rockets. The system can launch a medium-range rocket, which is the current plan, but is also capable of firing a longer-range missile, the Army Tactical Missile System, which has a range of about 190 miles (300 kilometers) and is not part of the plan.
Since the war began in February, the U.S. and its allies have tried to walk a narrow line: send Ukraine weapons needed to fight off Russia, but stop short of providing aid that will inflame Russian President Vladimir Putin and trigger a broader conflict that could spill over into other parts of Europe.
Over time, however, the U.S. and allies have amped up the weaponry going into Ukraine, as the fight has shifted from Russia’s broader campaign to take the capital, Kyiv, and other areas, to more close-contact skirmishes for small pieces of land in the east and south.
To that end, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has been pleading with the West to send multiple launch rocket systems to Ukraine as soon as possible to help stop Russia’s destruction of towns in the Donbas. The rockets have a longer range than the howitzer artillery systems that the U.S. has provided Ukraine. They would allow Ukrainian forces to strike Russian troops from a distance outside the range of Russia’s artillery systems.
“We are fighting for Ukraine to be provided with all the weapons needed to change the nature of the fighting and start moving faster and more confidently toward the expulsion of the occupiers,” Zelenskyy said in a recent address.
Ukraine needs multiple launch rocket systems, said Philip Breedlove, a retired U.S. Air Force general who was NATO’s top commander from 2013 to 2016.
“These are very important capabilities that we have not gotten them yet. And they not only need them, but they have been very vociferous in explaining they want them,” said Breedlove. “We need to get serious about supplying this army so that it can do what the world is asking it to do: fight a world superpower alone on the battlefield.”
U.S. and White House officials had no public comment on the specifics of the aid package.
“We continue to consider a range of systems that have the potential to be effective on the battlefield for our Ukrainian partners. But the point the president made is that we won’t be sending long-range rockets for use beyond the battlefield in Ukraine,” State Department Ned Price said Tuesday. “As the battle has shifted its dynamics, we have also shifted the type of security assistance that we are providing to them, in large part because they have asked us for the various systems that are going to be more effective in places like the Donbas.”
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Russia has been making incremental progress in the Donbas, as it tries to take the remaining sections of the region not already controlled by Russian-backed separatists.
Putin has repeatedly warned the West against sending greater firepower to Ukraine. The Kremlin said Putin held an 80-minute telephone call Saturday with the leaders of France and Germany in which he warned against the continued transfers of Western weapons.
Overall, the United States has committed approximately $5 billion in security assistance to Ukraine since the beginning of the Biden administration, including approximately $4.5 billion since the Russia invaded on Feb. 24.